Cola Comparison Test
Here's an amateur test of various no sugar cola fizzy drinks. Main goal was to see if cheap cola drinks can be matched against popular Coca Cola Zero and Pepsi Max as well if it's possible to tell a zero sugar drink from a sugar drink. Secondary goal was to compare prices of various colas on the market. Coca Cola with sugar was used as a sugary drink.
Drinks were bought in France in various markets in summer 2021, all drinks were in aluminium cans and had 330 ml volume.
Test was performed on 6 persons (male and female). Colas were assigned random numbers from 1 to 6 and given in a non-distinguishable plastic bottles for tasting. Then a score was given from 1 to 5, score was later normalised (against maximum score for a given person). Final score is an average over normalised scores.
Score table below.
| No | Cola Brand | Person 1 | Person 2 | Person 3 | Person 4 | Person 5 | Person 6 | Average score (norm.) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cola Zero Carrefour | 4,0 | 2,0 | 3,0 | 1,0 | 4,0 | 4,0 | 0,7 |
| 2 | Jean's Zero | 2,0 | 4,0 | 2,0 | 1,0 | 5,0 | 2,0 | 0,6 |
| 3 | Coca Cola | 2,0 | 5,0 | 2,0 | 2,0 | 3,0 | 3,0 | 0,6 |
| 4 | Look Cola Zero | 4,0 | 2,0 | 3,0 | 1,0 | 5,0 | 2,0 | 0,6 |
| 5 | Pepsi Max | 3,0 | 3,0 | 4,0 | 3,0 | 5,0 | 5,0 | 0,9 |
| 6 | Coca Cola Zero | 4,0 | 4,0 | 3,0 | 2,0 | 4,0 | 3,0 | 0,8 |
Two most known brands - Pepsi and Coca Cola - won with scores 0,9 and 0,8, but other brands not that far behind. Interestingly Coca Cola with sugar didn't score high, possibly due to increased popularity of zero sugar drinks and "alien" taste of sugar in this fizzy drink.
Participants were also asked which cola contains sugar.
| No | Cola Brand | Person 1 | Person 2 | Person 3 | Person 4 | Person 5 | Person 6 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cola Zero Carrefour | Sugar | |||||
| 2 | Jean's Zero | Sugar | |||||
| 3 | Coca Cola | Sugar | Sugar | Sugar | |||
| 4 | Look Cola Zero | ||||||
| 5 | Pepsi Max | Sugar | |||||
| 6 | Coca Cola Zero |
Three out of six correctly guessed which drink contains sugar.
Here's a price comparison as of September 2021:
| No | Cola Brand | Price per 1 L | Brand of… | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cola Zero Carrefour | 0,88 € | Carrefour | Can 0,33 l, pack of 6 |
| 2 | Jean's Zero | 0,83 € | E.Leclerc | Can 0,33 l, pack of 6 |
| 3 | Coca Cola | 1,50 € | The Coca-Cola Company | Slim can 0,33 l, pack of 6, price from: E.Leclerc |
| 4 | Look Cola Zero | 0,85 € | Intermarché | Can 0,33 l, pack of 6 |
| 5 | Pepsi Max | 0,98 € | PepsiCo | Can 0,33 l, pack of 6, price from: E.Leclerc |
| 6 | Coca Cola Zero | 1,44 € | The Coca-Cola Company | Slim can, pack of 6, price from: Carrefour |
Notably Coca Cola is more expensive than other brands, even Pepsi. Pepi Max is around 1 €, cheap colas are around 0,85 €. Note that these prices are for aluminium can, plastic bottles will be cheaper, glass is usually more expensive.
Table with ingridients as taken from the packaging.
| No | Cola Brand | Ingridient 1 | Colorant | Arome | Acidifiant | Acidifiant | Sweetener | Sweetener | Acidity corrector | Other | Phenylalanine |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Cola Zero Carrefour | eau gazeifiee | caramel au sulfite d’ammonium | aromes naturels | acide orthophosphorique | sucralose | acesulfame-K | citrates de sodium | cafeine | ||
| 2 | Jean's Zero | eau gazeifiee | caramel E150d | aromes naturels | E338 | aspartame | acesulfame-K | E331iii | cafeine | Yes | |
| 3 | Coca Cola | eau gazeifiee | E150d | aromes naturels | acide phosphorique | sugar | cafeine | ||||
| 4 | Look Cola Zero | eau gazeifiee | caramel E150d | aromes naturels | E338 | sucralose | acesulfame de potassium | citrate de sodium | cafeine | ||
| 5 | Pepsi Max | eau gazeifiee | caramel E150d | aromes naturels | acide phosphorique | acide citrique | aspartame | acesulfame-K | citrate de sodium | cafeine | Yes |
| 6 | Coca Cola Zero | eau gazeifiee | caramel E150d | aromes naturels | acide phosphorique | citrate de sodium | aspartame | acesulfame-K | cafeine | Yes |
By checking Wikipedia we can tell that E338 is phosphoric acid and E331iii is trisodium citrate and sometimes is referred as sodium citrate. Orthophosphoric acid is a different name for phosphoric acid. E150d is sulfite ammonia caramel.
Phenylalanine presence is given likely for those who have phenyloketonuria. Aspartame is source of phenylalanine.
What we can see is that all cola drinks use the same ingredients, except sweeteners used in case of Look Cola Zero and Cola Zero Carrefour and obviously for "normal" Coca Cola it's a plain sugar. Some ingridiends are not present in some drinks.
Interesting find in E.Leclerc...
Transparent cola which doesn't have a colorant. There's a noticable difference in taste (not counting sugar) and, if not told about what it is, some persons were not sure what type of drink is it. Another notable example of clear cola is Crystal Pepsi.
Conclusions. Most of the zero sugar cola drinks have the same ingridients and Coca Cola brand is substantially more expensive than other brands.